


Atlas

by whatthedruidscallme



Category: Crimes of Grindelwald - Fandom, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-14
Updated: 2018-12-14
Packaged: 2019-09-17 20:57:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16981671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatthedruidscallme/pseuds/whatthedruidscallme
Summary: Theseus Scamander's grief after losing Leta Lestrange is unimaginable. Days waste away to nothing and every night at dusk, Newt brings his brother into the suitcase as he checks on every creature, and Theseus offers no objection. In fact, he says nothing at all. But while Newt finds comfort, Theseus doubts he will find anything except shame and terror of losing even a breath of Leta's memory.





	Atlas

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to tinascamandar for the idea :) please let me know what you think!

The stars wheeled far above him, a glittering atlas of indifferent constellations. Pinpricks of fascinating light.  
And she was there.  
In the shadows he heard whispering at the edge of his hearing. The smile that glinted just where he couldn't see, the smell of spiced honey and secrets drifting from around the corner.  
She was in the weight that pressed on his very lungs, a grief so overwhelming, so utterly human he could hardly contain it. 

Days passed like photographs. Snapshots of his brother's grief, of people with blurred faces murmuring how very sorry they were, a brief grasp of cold skin before they left, and all the while he felt as different to them as though he were from another race entirely. 

It had taken weeks for Newt to lure him into the suitcase. He was wrong-footed and awkward and grief still rose like waves inside of him, like a tide he washed his feet in every day, and even as he watched his brother's grief fade to love for the creatures he took such care of, he couldn't bring himself to care. He watched, aimlessly, as Newt gently tugged him from one strange creature to another, and when a spark of interest flickered inside of him he ignored it. The shame he felt for dividing his attention, even for an instant, strangled everything else. 

But it became a habit. Every day, as clouds were tinged with fire and the sun sank with flames licking at the horizon, Newt would wordlessly pull him out of his armchair and he would come. He would step into the suitcase, down to the bottom where Newt would be waiting for him, and follow his little brother into the world he had created.  
Nifflers, moon calfs, graphorns, erumpents, Grindylows, they all chittered curiously around him. Some seeking attention, others solitude, and slowly he became familiar with them. Without knowing it, he learned their names, their mannerisms, and the shame that had strangled everything except her smile faded.  
He still woke every morning with her name on his lips. Her scent still clouded his mind and the days were still milky grey and empty, but every night he would wait until Newt came to get him, and it was in the suitcase a smile first crossed his face. He remembered the relief emanating from Newt, so strong it was nearly tangible. He remembered thinking, with a pang that Newt loved him. Of course he did.  
And he had loved her too.  
It was a night like any other when Newt didn't come at all. He waited with his hands clasped around a cup of cold tea a still broken-hearted Tina had given him, and watched as the day grew old and the night took his place, and still Newt didn't come. It was some hours later before he remembered Newt telling him the night before he'd be gone. That he would be on his own, but that Tina would be there.  
He had noticed his brother's eyes softening as he said her name. 

Even without his brother, it was with some measure of shock he realized he still wanted to go. He wondered if he should. He wondered if, without Newt there, he could even bring himself to get up. 

In the end, he didn't go. 

The next night was the same. Ceaseless thoughts ran circles around his mind like a picture show, memories so horribly endearing, so grotesquely twisted now, he didn't realize night had fallen until he heard the muffled sounds of Tina crying in the next room.  
She never cried in daylight. He wondered detachedly whether it was because it was easier to face in daylight, or whether it was to hide it from Newt, but either way he wasn't here now.  
With a sudden sense of reckless abandonment, he stood up, silhouette in the darkness, and walked to the suitcase sitting by Newt's bed. Had he been less involved in his own thoughts, he might have wondered why Newt didn't take it with him. 

He flung it open and stepped inside, breathing in the familiar scent that accompanied the suitcase. This mix of of a thousand different ecosystems, mingled with something that was undeniably Newt. It was a strange comfort to have. 

He wandered, watching curious eyes follow him as he whispered to everyone he had met, listening to the rustling of trees and keen whistling of night wind.  
He wound restlessly through to the murtlap, a Grindylow he had made friends with, to Dougal, who almost seemed to smile and finally to the nifflers's small cave before sinking to his knees.  
He didn't realize there were tears spilling down his face until they landed in his lap, scalding his numb fingertips.  
Because somewhere amidst the roughness of the wand he knew so well, the taste of crisp air, the shift of old light in an older sky, the sound of a breath and the smell of dust, somewhere along the way, he had lost her. 

He buried his hands in his face and gasped for air, sobs wracking his body.  
She was gone. She had chosen to go.  
It felt like eons before he felt something soft brushing next to him, and with great shuddering breaths, he looked down to find a niffler nuzzling at him. It looked up at him with curious eyes, probably wondering what he was doing making so much noise when they were trying to sleep.

As suddenly as the idea had taken him to come here, now he was abruptly too exhausted to contemplate going anywhere else. With a final, almost unconscious sob he curled up next to the niffler, and as he did, more waddled out to burrow next to him. 

It was in the early hours before dawn when Newt came home to find Tina asleep in his bed and his brother asleep in his suitcase.

The stars still glimmered above him when Theseus Scamander woke, the same stars as they had always been, but perhaps not as indifferent as he had once thought.


End file.
